


The highest Room of the Tallest Tower

by greenhairedfae



Series: Disney femslash drabbles [11]
Category: Beauty and the Beast (1991), Disney - All Media Types, Disney Cartoons (Classic), Disney Princesses, Sleeping Beauty (1959)
Genre: Disney femslash, F/F, Reading Aloud, Replace The Prince
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-04-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:28:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23751595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenhairedfae/pseuds/greenhairedfae
Summary: Belle was looking for some quiet.
Relationships: Aurora/Belle (Disney)
Series: Disney femslash drabbles [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1459012
Kudos: 20





	The highest Room of the Tallest Tower

In the highest room of the tallest tower she slept. Every day Belle would climb the steps up, past the snoring statuary. The townsfolk found the castle in the woods eerie, haunted with the not dead ghosts of the life that was lived there a hundred years past. They traded tales of wickedness and sloth, crossing their hearts and throwing salt over their shoulders with a twisted fascination that none would admit to.

At first Belle came here for the quiet. An absence of stares and cruel words was appreciated and soon she found comfort in the persistent slow breathing of the castle. As Belle explored, her entrancement of the castle grew. Each sleeper had fallen asleep at their post, encapsulating the day to day in an instant. Milkmaids leaned on their cows, buckets long dried of milk, nobles fell under a table with their minstrel, still clutching his lute. Did they know the fate that befell them?

Belle cataloged each sleeping person, growing fondly familiar with the sight. Grandmothers curled around their cobwebbed knitting, the blacksmith made his anvil into the worst pillow. There was only one on a bed, perfectly arranged and still, not a curl out of place. 

Her room was removed from the rest of the castle by a long spiraling stair. And while the rest of the castle thrummed with an even consistent snore, this room was completely silent. 

When Belle found the room she felt disquieted by the dead air of the room and for the first time in years she found herself reading to another person. She was not afraid of the sleeping castle and determined herself to prove it as if by remaining in the deathly quiet she could undo the pounding of her breast. At first she just tutted commentaries as if the sleeper in the bed were the bookseller on a slow day asking what she thought about what she'd read, then practiced monologues from plays, poetry and finally she found herself saving the best bits of books to be read aloud. "I take my bones inscribed by those who came before, and learn to court myself under a violence of stars."

As she spoke to the woman in the bed, she felt a sort of self love reflected outward, the inner bliss of sharing oneself made the room grow less oppressively still. Birds sang outside and Belle saw a cow slap its tail. Color came to the sleeping woman's cheeks and winter turned to spring. Belle found herself stringing flowers over the woman's bed, telling her about her days, how Gaston stalked her around town while the villagers whispered things she wasn't supposed to hear, and that there were stories of things out of bounds, she wanted so much more than her world could ever give. 

Sometimes Belle imagined the response, tinkling like glass at the edges of her periphery, a princess's laughter at the daughter of a peasant's dreams. Other times she dreamt of a soft clear voice whispering encouragement, humming melodies that would ghost through the rest of Belle's days. They'd come unbidden to the forefront of her mind and she sang them back as she climbed the stair, voice husky and dry by comparison.

At a certain point, Belle couldn't place when exactly, the princess had overtaken Belle's nights with stories of fairies and grudges and songs she only half remembered. Maurice was worried, she spent as much time as she could in the castle, reading and didn't wake in the morning like she had before, preferring to linger in her dreams. And truthfully Belle understood, she felt more disconnected than ever from village life, displaced from pretending to care, but she felt too far gone. And so she made her plans. 

"This will be the last time I come here." Belle spoke aloud to the room at the top of the tower at last. "My father worries I'm not myself anymore and he's right to worry." The air felt heavy and heady with honeysuckle, which wound its way up the spire. "I am not as I was. I need to leave this place, go to a place where my whole life isn't planned out for me, see the world." Belle was scared, thoroughly terrified at the possibilities awaiting her, "I'll miss you." She stooped down to kiss the woman's cheek and no sooner had her lips brushed against it than she heard a clattering from the courtyard.

She looked away to investigate the noise when she heard a soft light voice, "Take me with you?"

And so she did.

**Author's Note:**

> The poem Belle is reading is All of Us by Erika L. Sanchez.


End file.
